Patients suffering from Parkinson's disease (PD) frequently have periods in which their mobility becomes difficult, often resulting in an inability to move. Abnormally low levels of dopamine, a neurotransmitter that affects mobility and control of the skeletal-muscular system, is commonly believed to be the main cause of these motor symptoms in PD patients. However, administration of dopamine is not effective to treat the motor symptoms of Parkinson's disease because dopamine does not cross the blood-brain barrier. To resolve this problem, PD patients are administered levodopa, the metabolic precursor of dopamine, but levodopa is not without its issues.
Over time patients treated with LD exhibit symptoms of “wearing off,” where a single dose of levodopa no longer lasts as long as in the early days of levodopa therapy (usually 5-10 years after start of levodopa therapy). Such patients may develop motor fluctuations characterized by end-of-dose failure, peak dose dyskinesia, and akinesia. The advanced form of motor fluctuations (also commonly referred to as the “on-off” phenomenon) is characterized by unpredictable swings from mobility to immobility. Although the causes of these motor fluctuations are not completely understood, advanced patients generally benefit from treatment regimens that produce steady plasma levels of LD, such as through intestinal infusion of LD as such delivery method may mimic normally tonic endogenous dopamine. However, intestinal infusion of LD is restrictive, invasive and cumbersome. Oral delivery of LD is preferred, but plasma concentration levels remain difficult to control via oral delivery.
Combinations of levodopa (LD) and a decarboxylase inhibitor (typically carbidopa (CD)) to treat Parkinson's disease (PD) are known in the pharmaceutical arts. Currently, several formulations containing a combination of LD and CD are commercially available, e.g., SINEMET®, SINEMET® CR, STALEVO®, PARCOPA®, and their corresponding generic products. In addition, a decarboxylase inhibitor approved for use outside of the United States, is benserazide, which may be given in combination with levodopa.
Nonetheless, a need remains for an oral LD formulation that provides steadier plasma concentrations of LD with minimal ‘peak-to-trough’ fluctuations during daily dosing and that yields a longer duration-of-effect than the commercially available oral dosage forms of LD. In addition, it is desirable for an oral LD formulation to provide therapeutic blood levels of LD quickly, thereby providing a rapid “on” to a PD patient in need thereof.